Sunday, December 02, 2012

Mr. Obama, scarred by failed negotiations in his first term and emboldened by a clear if close election to a second, has emerged as a different kind of negotiator in the past week or two, sticking to the liberal line and frustrating Republicans on the other side of the bargaining table.

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Bob Costas says he made a 'mistake' while talking about gun control at halftime of Sunday Night Football game

Costas started the firestorm with the halftime comments in which he said, 'If Jovan Belcher didn’t possess a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins (the girlfriend he killed) would both be alive today.'

Apparently, according to Bob Costas, no man has ever beaten a woman to death in a domestic violence situation. No man has ever used a knife or his hands. All men in the throws of jealous rages search for a gun, and, failing to find one, go sit down and calmly play XBox.

All victims of domestic violence are shot with guns.

Now that Costas has marginalized himself, maybe the adults in the NFL football audience can discuss the issue intelligently. Presuming they don't want to just, you know, watch football.

That is true, and since you were the only one to point that out, I'm obviously not conveying my point very well. The figure for US GDP is misleading. Take Apple. All of their manufacturing, and hence all of the real value their company creates by using labour to convert raw materials to a manufactured good that is worth much, much more than the commidity value of its components, is done outside the US. Yet their earnings are counted towards US GDP. The money that American consumers use to buy their products (or any products for that matter) largely comes from new debt. As I have said a million times, when money is created as debt, more debt it required to pay off the initial principal + interest, and it snowballs from there. If the US were still creating a lot of actual material wealth by converting iron ore to steel, steel to appliances, oil to plastic to consumer products, etc., etc., the new wealth created can keep pace with the fake debt wealth created to keep things from falling apart. That is no longer the case. The US economy is supported disproportionately by debt-based consumers spending, and unless that changes drastically (i.e. repatriation of middle class jobs), its going to fall apart.

It is simply common sense to me that debt cannot be accrued infinitely, which is basically Geithner's plan.

I'm pretty sure you can't get a standard transmission in the US if you wanted one.

You can - at least, on most coupe models - and it's still cheaper...

I wouldn't call myself a car guy by any stretch, but I do have a real weakness for Mustangs - and last time out car-shopping summer before last, I came thisclose to going manual (would have been about $1700 cheaper), but ultimately - I just knew I'd end up hating it since 90% of my driving is a standard city-to-suburbs, rush hour expressway commute.

Yeah, but it looks cooler than trying to pretend your auto-on-the-floor is really a stick...

I don't mind automatics, but I am offended by automatics pretending to be manuals. Driving properly involves all four paws. If there's not a clutch under your left foot, just drive the automatic and admit it.

Not being a driver I'm speaking from total ignorance here, but is automatic transmission a North American thing? The vast majority of people I know in North America drive automatic, and I've yet to meet anyone who drives automatic, or be in a car that is automatic, in Europe.

Guns aren't the only way to kill someone...though they are one of the more effective ways.

Costas' point was valid. He was basically arguing that guns facilitate rage killings in ways that other weapons don't. This is obviously true on the face. Yes, there are victims of domestic violence who are murdered by other means, but that in no way changes the simple fact that guns remove the actor from the action and reduce the action-decision down to milliseconds rather than seconds or minutes. To argue otherwise is absurd.

Not being a driver I'm speaking from total ignorance here, but is automatic transmission a North American thing? The vast majority of people I know in North America drive automatic, and I've yet to meet anyone who drives automatic, or be in a car that is automatic, in Europe.

I've seen plenty of automatic transmissions outside the US, but generally yeah, they're much more common in the US than outside it. Not entirely sure why; maybe operating the clutch is too much like exercise for fatty Americans. Or maybe it's too hard to shovel greasy food into our snackholes while operating a manual. We may never really know the truth.

Not being a driver I'm speaking from total ignorance here, but is automatic transmission a North American thing? The vast majority of people I know in North America drive automatic, and I've yet to meet anyone who drives automatic, or be in a car that is automatic, in Europe.

I go back and forth between the U.S. and India and would share your same observation. No one in India that I've met has an automatic. My problem is trying to learn how to shift with my left hand while driving on the sub-continent.

My anecdotal understanding is that manual transmissions are more easily repaired, and are thus far more popular in emerging markets. I suspect it's also the case that Americans drive automatics just because, and Europe never made that switch. Sort of an inverse metric system.

A former GF 's father had to get his SUV from the factory because he wanted it to be manual instead of automatic. Absolutely horrible driver, the last thing in the world he needed was something to occupy all four of his limbs and most of senses while also trying to watch the road. Every single time you got in the car with him you either got into an accident or almost got into one. The man actually ran over someone in the Vet parking lot one time while leaving a Phillies game.

If the US were still creating a lot of actual material wealth by converting iron ore to steel, steel to appliances, oil to plastic to consumer products, etc., etc., the new wealth created can keep pace with the fake debt wealth created to keep things from falling apart. That is no longer the case.

So what is your solution to the staggering amount of poverty and starvation that would be created by tying money to actual hard assets? If our country was on the gold standard our economy would be a fraction of the size it is today and even if you want to argue about what is and isn't in this country we'd still have a massively smaller economy that would not satisfy the population.

I suspect it's also the case that Americans drive automatics just because, and Europe never made that switch.

But "why?" is the interesting question.

Automatics were heavily marketed by US carmakers, presumably because they yielded a better margin, in the US in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, and they became the primary mode. Was that driven by consumer demand or did the US carmakers succeed in "teaching" the market to prefer the more expensive product? Why didn't the same dynamic take place in Europe?

#906 There are of course other methods of suicide (or murder for that matter) but they generally have higher failure rates. There's at least some chance that Perkins and/or Belcher would be alive.

For Ray: I can't find a full list of murders and suicides by NFL players. But the last 6 suicides I'm aware of were all by gun (Belcher, O.J. Murdock, Junior Seau, Ray Easterling, Dave Duerson, Kenny McKinley) and another 3 were killed by guns (Steve McNair, Sean Taylor, Darrent Williams) (And no, not selective endpoints. I just don't have a list going back further.)

I can't find a list of murders by NFL players, but I can't think of any that weren't by gun. Oh NFL players are high up on the list of people who could kill without guns, but evidently they don't choose to.

Considering Belcher killed her and then drove to practice and killed himself, I don't think simple rage explains this one. But I do agree with Sam. Guns make it much easier to kill someone. I don't think guns should be banned, or overly regulated though.

Automatics were heavily marketed by US carmakers, presumably because they yielded a better margin, in the US in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, and they became the primary mode. Was that driven by consumer demand or did the US carmakers succeed in "teaching" the market to prefer the more expensive product? Why didn't the same dynamic take place in Europe?

theoretically, the longer commutes from burgeoning suburbia and generally less dense population in the US made the automatic a better choice. Who needs a stick if you are driving for an hour at a constant speed of 60?

Automatics were heavily marketed by US carmakers, presumably because they yielded a better margin, in the US in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, and they became the primary mode. Was that driven by consumer demand or did the US carmakers succeed in "teaching" the market to prefer the more expensive product? Why didn't the same dynamic take place in Europe?

Didn't automatics come out in a period when cars were much bigger, power steering wasn't universal, ABS didn't exists, and the shifting wasn't as friendly as it is now?

Considering Belcher killed her and then drove to practice and killed himself, I don't think simple rage explains this one.

Actually, I think the drive-to-practice suicide supports the rage-killing theory. His actions after the murder all scream "shock and terror about what I just did."

1. Get really angry.
2. Pull the piece and kill your child's mother.
2a. In front of your mom.
3. Go into shock due to the fact that you just went into a killing rage and blew your child's mother away. In front of your mom.
4. Drive to Arrowhead to 'say goodbye' to your coaches.
5. Finish it.

Everything suggests Belcher killed Perkins in a rash moment, then went into shock and despair as he coasted along to the logical end. And everything suggests that those sort of rage killings are facilitated via firearms. He might have killed her otherwise, but the gun made it faster, easier and more likely. That's what guns do. To argue otherwise is to misapprehend the entire purpose of a firearm.

I've seen plenty of automatic transmissions outside the US, but generally yeah, they're much more common in the US than outside it. Not entirely sure why; maybe operating the clutch is too much like exercise for fatty Americans. Or maybe it's too hard to shovel greasy food into our snackholes while operating a manual. We may never really know the truth.

For one thing, automatics had the hell promoted out of them when they were first introduced in Oldsmobiles before WWII as "Hydra-Matics". Looking at this ad, it's not hard to tell where Bruce McCall got his material, and you couldn't be a truly modern American without one. By the end of the 50's, only peasants, beatniks and juvenile delinquents still favored sticks.

Who needs a stick if you are driving for an hour at a constant speed of 60?

Those commutes didn't happen until the 1960's and 1970's well after the arrival and adoption of the automatic. Besides wouldn't long car rides at the same speed be a point in favor of choosing the cheaper manual option than the more expensive automatic option? Automatics are the better choice for city traffic in terms of comfort.

Didn't automatics come out in a period when cars were much bigger, power steering wasn't universal, ABS didn't exists, and the shifting wasn't as friendly as it is now?

Yeah, that also accounts for a lot of the explanation. Most U.S. gear shifts back then were located in the steering wheel and made a fairly loud noise whenever you shifted.

And it wasn't just manual clutches that were gradually zapped nearly out of existence. Does anyone under about 65 remember the manual choke? Those were lovely little gizmos that could stall your car without a second's notice if you didn't operate in perfectly before the engine got fully warmed up.

Ron: What is the difference between having a gun at your disposal and a knife at your disposal in a domestic violence situation such as the one Belcher was in?

Or simply having your hands. He could have broken her windpipe or snapped her neck within a couple of seconds with his bare hands. A gun is faster? It probably took him longer to find the gun than it would have taken to beat her to death with his fists.

If our country was on the gold standard our economy would be a fraction of the size it is today and even if you want to argue about what is and isn't in this country we'd still have a massively smaller economy that would not satisfy the population.

This is where we get back to the lunacy of privatized central banking for private profits, when the money creation role should belong to the government itself (at arms length of course, to reduce political influence). Breaking away from the gold standard, coupled with the fact the the Federal Reserve is a private entity whose primary mandate is to extract interest payments out of the US government, is why we have runaway debt. An economy can be grown at a reasonable rate through nationalized central bank currency injections in the form of national public works programs, funding of R&D, etc., and in those cases, there is actual value added to system to back the increased money supply.

Good highways, airports, seaports, public transportation, and the technological advances in these sectors and others that come from R&D funding all provide a tangible benefit to society. People buying crap at Walmart that will break or be worn out in a yeat with their credit cards do not. It all comes down to sustainability. A debt-based economy will never be sustainable. It may last for 20-40-100 years, but at some point it simply has to fail.

Totally a matter of personal preference. IMO you're much more aware of what you're doing when you're forced to pay constant attention to a particular motion. In my experience automatics make it way to easy to imagine that you're on autopilot. But then I grew up with them and wouldn't buy an automatic no matter what, so my bias is duly noted.

Ron: What is the difference between having a gun at your disposal and a knife at your disposal in a domestic violence situation such as the one Belcher was in?

I don't know the details of that particular killing, but if the potential victim can escape for a few seconds, she can lock a door or run outside and wake the neighborhood. You can't shoot a knife through a locked door.

Or simply having your hands. He could have broken her windpipe or snapped her neck within a couple of seconds with his bare hands. A gun is faster? It probably took him longer to find the gun than it would have taken to beat her to death with his fists.

Again, that presupposes a proximity and lack of escape route that isn't always the case, whether or not it may have been in this particular instance.

Ron: What is the difference between having a gun at your disposal and a knife at your disposal in a domestic violence situation such as the one Belcher was in?

Distance and physicality.

We have no evidence (that I have seen) that Belcher physically assaulted Perkins prior to this incident, do we?

The differing psychologies of beating or stabbing (which requires up-close physical contact as well) someone to death, vs shooting them at a distance, is just massive.

In domestic gun violence, the process is rarely "so s/he got the gun and killed them." It's usually "the assailant was brandishing the firearm" before it is used. The first step to this tragedy is getting the gun out *to intimidate and cower.* But when that doesn't work, when the victim doesn't cower and submit, then the assailant has a gun in his/her hand and has spent 30 minutes telling the victim what s/he would do if they don't get their way.

Costas broke in to halftime of an NFL game to make sure the public had the lefty viewpoint of the issue

A fact which has nothing to do with whether or not his point is true or not. But keep tilting at that windmill, Ray Ray.

Costas gave us HIS viewpoint, which -- sure, is probably shared by a fair number of lefties... but given the pushback, I highly doubt any needles have moved.

Beyond local urban liberals -- who certainly don't get/haven't gotten anything on the federal level and rarely, and then only in a few select states, get anything at the state level -- it's pointless.

I'm not saying Costas' little speech did this - I haven't even heard it and have no desire to do so - but it's been patently clear that any national conversation on firearms is pointless... I'm at peace with that.

The one thing I find interesting is how Bob Costas somehow gets to proxy the "lefty viewpoint" -- but if I were use Ted Nugent, who's been his loudest critic since the kerfuffle, as a proxy for the "righty viewpoint" -- the strawman cries would deafen people.

Yes, but though European cars were smaller, all the rest was just as true in Europe.

Sure but just going off of road miles for Europe in WWII didn't Europe have significantly less cars and roads than America? Furthermore weren't a good chunk of the miles driven in Europe done on shoddy roads or dirt roads. How many cars in Europe operated mostly in cities vs how man cars in America operated in cities? As Americans moved off the farm the need for a manual transmission decreased.

The one thing I find interesting is how Bob Costas somehow gets to proxy the "lefty viewpoint" -- but if I were use Ted Nugent, who's been his loudest critic since the kerfuffle, as a proxy for the "righty viewpoint" -- the strawman cries would deafen people.

Well to be fair Ted is, by his own admission, just a few months away from being dead or in jail. it would seem untoward to pile on at this point.

Totally a matter of personal preference. IMO you're much more aware of what you're doing when you're forced to pay constant attention to a particular motion. In my experience automatics make it way to easy to imagine that you're on autopilot. But then I grew up with them and wouldn't buy an automatic no matter what, so my bias is duly noted.

Driving a stick "in the city" is a fine experience, so far as I'm concerned -- it's really the monotonous stop-and-go traffic on the expressway that I find tedious...

Good highways, airports, seaports, public transportation, and the technological advances in these sectors and others that come from R&D funding all provide a tangible benefit to society. People buying crap at Walmart that will break or be worn out in a yeat with their credit cards do not. It all comes down to sustainability.

So instead of buying food, irons, books and such from Wal-Mart Americans should have been buying airports instead it? Got it. How many airports have you bought? I assume you live in some kind of adobe hut that is only furnished with heavy machinery.

Kind of funny, given I haven't posted in the politics thread in the last 2,000 or so posts.

And yet, your return is marked by the same even-handed approach to finding the truth rather than just random eye-poking. What was it about L'Affaire Costas that you found so compelling that it caused you to break radio silence?

Manuals use less gas, which is pretty important in Europe where it's about $7 a gallon.

European driving is pretty...interactive. There's a lot of upshifting and downshifting with short, twisty roads (even in cities) and traffic calming. I just can't imagine the somewhat laggy response of an automatic working too well in that environment.

Ron: What is the difference between having a gun at your disposal and a knife at your disposal in a domestic violence situation such as the one Belcher was in?

It's much easier to kill someone with a gun than a knife. With a knife, she can at least attempt to defend herself, or have time to run away, or expect that maybe the third person in the room (mom? mom-in-law?) might intervene and help stop it.

Finally, you're more likely to die from a bullet wound to a vital organ than a stab wound, simply because the knife isn't likely to fragment and cause multiple points of damage.

Well to be fair Ted is, by his own admission, just a few months away from being dead or in jail. it would seem untoward to pile on at this point.

That's fellow-columnist-at-WND to Rick Santorum to you, bub...

I do wish I could be looking forward to a Nuge-less world in 2014, but like most endtimes whackjobs - I have little doubt there will be explanations for why the gub'mint didn't arrest or off Ted once he's still yapping away.

It does boggle my mind how someone who #### his pants to avoid the draft, outdid Woody Allen in 'adopting' an underage girlfriend to get around age of consent laws, and makes Joe Walsh (the politician and the deadbeat dad loser, not the guitarist whose only crime was being part of the Eagles) look like father of the year has become such a family values, he-man hero...

In my regular list of 5 people I'd love to kick in the balls, Ted usually does quite well for himself.

Republican Sen. Tom Coburn said Wednesday that he would prefer the government raise more revenue by hiking tax rates, rather than by limiting deductions—a stance that departs from Republican leadership in the fiscal cliff negotiations.

"Personally, I know we have to raise revenue; I don't really care which way we do it," Coburn said, appearing on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” "Actually, I would rather see the rates go up than do it the other way, because it gives us greater chance to reform the tax code and broaden the base in the future."

That puts Coburn, a two-term senator from Oklahoma and leading deficit hawk, at odds with the leaders of his party, who have insisted that a tax rate increase on the wealthy is a non-starter in fiscal cliff talks. On Monday, top House Republicans proposed a deficit reduction package that would bring in $800 billion in new revenue over 10 years through limiting deductions for top earners.

It's much easier to kill someone with a gun than a knife. With a knife, she can at least attempt to defend herself, or have time to run away, or expect that maybe the third person in the room (mom? mom-in-law?) might intervene and help stop it.

Finally, you're more likely to die from a bullet wound to a vital organ than a stab wound, simply because the knife isn't likely to fragment and cause multiple points of damage.

I asked the question and I think these are fair answers, as are the answers Andy provided.

Ron: What is the difference between having a gun at your disposal and a knife at your disposal in a domestic violence situation such as the one Belcher was in?

Or simply having your hands. He could have broken her windpipe or snapped her neck within a couple of seconds with his bare hands. A gun is faster? It probably took him longer to find the gun than it would have taken to beat her to death with his fists.

It's actually fairly difficult even for an unusually strong man to reliably kill with his bare hands. Hurt or maim, sure.

(I see it's already covered)

I dimly recall a study comparing the rates of violent assaults in Vancouver with on the the North Pacific cities. The frequency of attacks were quite similar, but there was much less use of firearms in Vancouver and a lower death rate.

Manuals use less gas, which is pretty important in Europe where it's about $7 a gallon.

Used to be the case, but modern automatic transmissions have narrowed the gap a great deal at this point. Manuals are more fun to drive, and that's good enough for me.

Finally, you're more likely to die from a bullet wound to a vital organ than a stab wound, simply because the knife isn't likely to fragment and cause multiple points of damage.

Not necessarily true at all. Bullets kill through the same mechanism as knives really; bleeding. And stab wounds are serious, serious business. It's harder to get a good stab in on somebody as opposed to shooting them, but if you do, it's every bit as dangerous as a gunshot wound; perhaps more so depending on the respective knife and cartridge used.

It does boggle my mind how someone who #### his pants to avoid the draft, outdid Woody Allen in 'adopting' an underage girlfriend to get around age of consent laws, and makes Joe Walsh (the politician and the deadbeat dad loser, not the guitarist whose only crime was being part of the Eagles) look like father of the year has become such a family values, he-man hero...

He says he hates libruls, and says mean things about them. That's all you need to be considered a Real American in good standing.

Not necessarily true at all. Bullets kill through the same mechanism as knives really; bleeding. And stab wounds are serious, serious business. It's harder to get a good stab in on somebody as opposed to shooting them, but if you do, it's every bit as dangerous as a gunshot wound; perhaps more so depending on the respective knife and cartridge used

Yes. A dedicated actor can do massive damage with a small blade. Trust me on this one. I mean, seriously. I'm the "neck stabbing guy" for chrissakes. But the reason I prefer knives to guns is because guns remove the man from the act. There's a line in Book 3 (4?) of _Song of Fire and Ice_ where Brianne is on the road with Jaime Lannister and they get attacked by archers. In the ensuing combat, Jaime comments "I hate archers." That's the same way I feel about guns.

Oh, yeah! My first car was a '63 Ford Falcon (10 years older than I am). Didn't have to worry about locking the doors (Which is good, since they didn't really lock anymore) because I was the only person who could get that thing to start.

Sam: You are a woman. A man in a jealous rage grabs a gun and then starts threatening and shooting at you. Compare to: A man in a jealous rage grabs a knife and then starts threatening and coming at you to stab you.

WTF is the big difference, really? At the end of the day, you are in grave danger - is there any other kind? - of being seriously effed either way. And you are arguing as if there is some significant difference here.

Sam: You are a woman. A man in a jealous rage grabs a gun and then starts threatening and shooting at you. Compare to: A man in a jealous rage grabs a knife and then starts threatening and coming at you to stab you.

WTF is the big difference, really? At the end of the day, you are in grave danger - is there any other kind? - of being seriously effed either way.

Depends on how much space there is between them , how fast on her feet she is, whether or not she's got an escape route, how drunk he is, and how likely he is to fire his gun accidentally.

EDIT: coke to Sam, who can spot a fish in a barrel even faster than I can.

I think if you had 3 locked rooms each containing 50 angry men with one room the men are armed with nothing, the second room they are all armed with knives, and the final room they are all armed with handguns you'd find that after a month virtually everyone in in room 3 was either dead or wounded, everyone in room 1 had gotten into a fight at some point during the month, and in room 2 the least amount of violence occurred.

WTF is the big difference, really? At the end of the day, you are in grave danger - is there any other kind? - of being seriously effed either way.

Only tangentially related, but in the video game Battlefield 3, you can shoot an opponent from many different ways, with many different guns. Very normal, and nothing interesting about it.

However, if you want to STAB someone, you have to sneak up from behind them. When you start the stab, the game takes over and it shows you

grabbing the person from behind, swinging your arm in from the side and inserting the blade into their throat, and then pulling your hand back while removing their dogtags with the blade of your knife.
OR
spinning the person around, inserting the blade under their chin, and pulling the dog tags off with your other hand.

In both cases, you get this VERY CREEPY close up of the victim's face as they are stabbed. More often than not, the eyes roll back and they have a very panicked look on their faces as it happens.

It's VERY intense, and (even to a FPS gaming veteran like myself) very unnerving at times.

I don't own the game, but I've watched videos of gameplay (for other reasons) and when they show a stabbing, it creeps me out.

#978 You pretty clearly have more chance of evasion against a knife. And when you get down to it, there's at least some chance that a person won't actually be able to use the knife. it's not much when you're talking survival against a top caliber athlete, but it's probably something.

No woman is getting away from a 25 year old NFL linebacker unless she's a world class athlete herself AND the guy is drunk or otherwise impaired.

Tell me again exactly where in Ray's thought experiment he mentioned a 25 year old NFL linebacker? If you want to go specifically to the Javon Belcher case, replace "a couch" with "Javon Belcher's mom."

Tell me again exactly where in Ray's thought experiment he mentioned a 25 year old NFL linebacker? If you want to go specifically to the Javon Belcher case, replace "a couch" with "Javon Belcher's mom."

Did... did you just make a "Yo mama so fat..." joke about Belcher's mom?

Yes, if faced with a 25 year old NFL linebacker with a knife...well, you'd be better off facing me holding a gun.

Of course, if you could put a couch between yourself and me, me armed with a knife and I come after you, you should be thinking up legal defenses to explain being found with my dead body - a very good chance I trip on the couch and fall on my knife.

#978 You pretty clearly have more chance of evasion against a knife. And when you get down to it, there's at least some chance that a person won't actually be able to use the knife. it's not much when you're talking survival against a top caliber athlete, but it's probably something.

Let's think about it in Battle Royale terms.

You're all cast off on to a remote island with instructions directing everyone to a central Moai which looks suspiciously like Bud Selig. You're told to line up by height and then, in order, select one weapon from the heap, which you must use to ensure your survival on Primate Island. Oh, and if you don't kill one other person every day your neck bomb explodes. Did I mention the neck bomb collars?

Anyways, your survey the weaponry heap. Rank the available implements in order of your preference:

The actual problem is the murderer, not the weapon. Such a basic concept that people bizarrely fail to understand.

?

You think murder with a knife is as easy as murder with a gun?
If so, why are 7 out of 10 US murders committed with a firearm?
There are an order of magnitude more knives (and bare hands) than there are guns in America, so you'd think that would make them the more likely murder weapon if it was just as easy.